A Voice For The Rest Of Us

House Approves Training of Syrian Rebels

Today the House approved Obama’s plan to train Syrian rebels to fight the (un)Islamic State with a 273-to-156 vote. It is interesting to see that over one third of the House voted against the plan and that feelings were mixed among the parties. Many of Obama’s own Democrats (114-85) voted against the bill, with a majority of Republicans (159-71) favoring the plan. The Senate still has to approve the plan before it will be sent to the White House for Obama’s final signature of approval, but the vote is expected to come as early as September 18th. The measure is written as an amendment to a stopgap spending bill meant to fund the government until December 11th, which means the measure will have to be reapproved then. It is important to note that the measure does not allot any new money to pay for the arms or training, but merely grants Obama the authority to train the Syrians. The administration has sufficient resources for the current airstrike campaign and the program to assist the rebels in an existing fund covering overseas operations. The measure would merely allow the Pentagon to transfer money from that account as needed. If passed, this plan would allow the US to arm and train the Free Syrian Army in order to combat the IS.